When is a Strike Out the Third Time Lucky

It's more than just hot out: it's steaming hot. Temps are in the high teens and humidity is thickening the air to unbreathable. Because I have respiratory issues, I stay inside the air conditioned house when it's humid, and out of the burning sun when temps cross into trip digits. The three summer months each year I find things to do to keep me busy inside, rather than going outside; hence, I have boxes of yarn in what used to be a closet, but quickly became my storage center.

Ironically, I like making blankets, hats, scarves, and fingerless gloves, even though I am a desert rat by location, but not personal preference. I was born on the CA coast and prefer the cool dampness of the seashore, but my house value to mortgage is underwater and, contrary to all the boasting by the current President about how homeowners can refi and take advantage of the new, lower mortgage rates, unless the mortgagee has equity in the home, there is no refi, another disparity between media hype and practical application.

I digress, so back to the storage center filled with yarn. I both knit and crochet and enjoy taking a project from balls of yarn to something useful. I've been working on using up, rather than buying more, but the only way to accomplish that is to avoid any retail outlet that sells yarn and extend summer by another 12 months or so. Today, I decided to open yet another bag of yarn balls and pulled out some autumn colors to create a swirly pattern that (finished) sort of looks like an acorn (it's hard to see that the colors are chocolate brown, orange, and red at the top in the photo).

It took me three separate tries to get past row 4, which is unusual for me as I pre-read the pattern, gather all the goodies, and then hunker down until the hat/scarf/gloves are finished. Each time I finished row 4, something was off because the holes should have swirled, and mine meandered. I ripped out, cast on, and started again after carefully reviewing the directions. The third time, I cut the yarn, pulled the mess off the needles, tossed the disaster into the wastebasket, and went to the kitchen to make some noodles Alfredo for my lunch/dinner.

An hour later, I returned to the couch and started to put the yarn, needles and pattern away. I picked up the pattern, glanced at it, and realized I had been reading it incorrectly. To create the swirl, I had to begin each row differently, but the rest of the row was the same all the way across. DUH; I've done this pattern before, so I should have figured it out after screwing it up the first time, but had to do it wrong three times before I was able to see the pattern with fresh eyes.

The life lesson is this: walk away. If it doesn't have to be done right now, give it some time to percolate and come back to it later with a fresh perspective. Chances are the elusive idea will reform, the subtle difference will clarify, and the words on the page will read the way they are written, rather than the way we think they are written. Sometimes, taking the time to take some time is just what a problem/issue needs.